Unfortunate through life
By jtubilewicz
- 534 reads
I hated doing what my mum forcingly made me do. For example milking the cows, or perhaps feeding the chickens or watering the plants. All those farm activities were unbearable on a hot day of about 35 degrees Celsius when the only thing you would dream about is going to bed and sleeping over the boiling hours of the day. But sleep didn’t come as easily as I had thought, I also had to help my less able in maths sister, who wouldn’t understand anything I explained to her and help out in the farm. My evenings were very complicated, come to think of it. I mean living on a farm is much harder than in the city, but its much more fun when the chores are done.
So as my boring mother commanded, I dawdled down the stairs to find the grinning black and white cows waiting for a chance to kick me (as they always had done). In fact the cows on mother’s and father’s farm behaved very much like horses, and due to the fact, my dumb sister tried to teach them to gallop and perform all the little gymnastic tricks that Spanish horses do on Spanish festivals of horses.
Anyway, by the time I had finally milked the ‘immature’ cows, I had planned everything that I was going to do. I decided to creep into the house and prevent mother from giving me any more jobs. I can admit that what I had committed was quite selfish and I shouldn’t have done it, but I desperately needed some time to finish off my worthless, boring, useless maths project on the golden ratio. After all it was due in tomorrow and I would have had to do it one way or another.
The rest of the day crept slowly by, and finally the sun faded away, taking the unbearable weather with it. My father came home really late that night and introduced me to the new set of chickens that he had bought at the market, naming each one as they hopped out of their cages. That little moment with my father was agonizingly boring, and I’m sure that from what you have read so far you can admit that I am a very moany and spoilt person. I am Neo Nick and I am thirteen years old.
The next day my mother woke me up looking very angry. I could tell that I was in trouble. “Your father asked you to get up early today and help him with the new chickens! I can’t see you dressed and hard working!” I didn’t answer to my mother’s cries of criticism about my behaviour but got up and quickly began to change. However she didn’t seem to understand my apologetic face expressions and silences which meant that I going down to help right away but instead she started weeping on my bed. “Mother , I’m sorry I won’t do that again, I promise. Stop wailing or you’ll look like a frog with red puffy eyes!” I tried to cheer her up with our old family joke, but what I have said must have been taken as an offence and mother burst out of the room slamming the door in my guilty face. ‘Everything seems to be on fire today’ I thought ‘I must watch my mouth’.
I hurried out of my malodorous smelling room and accidentally ran into my poor tired father climbing up the monstrous stairs, knocking him backwards. He started cursing under his breath, but it all rapidly turned into a big shout back argument! All that I heard from this massacre was my father shouting that I was an arrogant little brut and that I will be grounded for the next three months. I guess that I could agree with the first part, but three months was a quarter of the year and it seemed unbelievingly long to me. Ignoring my mother’s weeps and cries and my father’s cursing and my little sister dumbstruck in the whole situation, I ran out of the house slamming the door hard and feeling malevolent for the whole family. I could feel the bad day ahead.
“Professor Awingale? Could I borrow mister Nick for ten minutes?”
“Yes of course. Neo Nick I want that homework done and the project fully completed by tomorrow.”
“Yes professor” I answered, stuffing my books in my rucksack and following the teacher that I have never seen before.
As soon as I heard the message I raced through the corridors and glancing back menacingly I saw the teacher standing there like a statue glaring at me go. I felt tears gathering in my eyes.
I found my sister’s class and told the teacher that my professor wanted to see her about some homework (which was a big lie, but the teacher seemed to have believed me). Together we sprinted across the shabby, old, foul-smelling corridors of St. Francis of Assisi’s high school. Taking two stairs at a time, shouting to the receptionist that there’s a family emergency and bursting out of the squeaky black doors. We hurdled over the tiny useless, brick wall and desperately flew into Victor’s (my brother’s) primary school. I quickly explained to the teacher what had happened and asked (hopefully) politely for my brother.
The bus from town took absolutely ages! It was disgraceful! Victor sat on my lap uneasily and Lara stood next to the antique bus doors. All the grannies and grandpas around us gave me puzzled looks (probably because it was eleven in the morning and we were coming back from school), and everyone seemed very weary and bored of life. The bus driver didn’t even ask me for my bus ticket which happened to be my advantage because I didn’t have it with me that day.
When we finally got off the packed bus, straight away, Victor began questioning me about everything that’s happened. I tried to ignore him, after explaining to him that it was a serious matter and that he will see what had happened later. But to my great misfortune he noticed the snack shop and began his begging for a sweet. Well he was only six, but it’s unbelievable how naïve children can be.
We stood in front of the ashes and the ruined structure of what in the early morning was our home. “Mummy and daddy will come anytime now, won’t they Neo?”
“Of course they will Vic, they wouldn’t leave us alone” I answered knowing full well that they won’t be back. They’ve gone. They are asleep under the ruins.
Five long minutes later, the special services arrived together with the head of the orphanage and the police. Lara had tears running down her damp cheeks all the time, Victor was becoming more and more restless and began calling mother and father, and I just stood there horror struck gaping at the place where I ate, slept and grew up. Where in the morning I left my mother to tears and father to swearing, and I knew that I will never forgive myself for such a goodbye. But then who knew that this would happen?
I knew that God was angry with me and that he had punished me severely for my ungratefulness and arrogance. I knew what was coming up. I knew I had to change my attitude.
My guardian said that I was to share a room with a boy called Oliver. Victor was sharing with some Irish boy Prosper who was a bit younger than me, and Lara shared a room with a girl younger than herself. I wasn’t happy with the split from my brother and sister because I just started realising how much both of them meant to me. I didn’t want them to go. I promised myself that from now on I will look after them like a real big brother. “Goodnight Vic, Lara” I told them as we waved each other off. “I love you both”. I could tell from their little anxious faces that they were surprised to hear such a goodnight after all the arguments we had back home, which now seemed like decades ago.
The grief of the loss of both parents just like that was absolutely unstoppable. It tailed me where ever I went. It was unexplainable. The grief was unbelievably hard to expiate. Nothing explicit satisfied it. Nothing. The disease of grief caught me and held on tight, like nothing before...
As I entered my small greyish room, I guessed that the kids didn’t have a perfect time living in this place. There were two beds at the far corner of the room, that looked like the hospital beds people used to have during World War Two, which I knew weren’t comfortable at all. By the door was a wardrobe that looked damp and full of splinters and on the other side of the doors was a little polished table which seemed like the only nice thing in my room. My eyes drifted to the underneath of the table, where I could just see the tiny blue lockers which I knew were for safekeeping of any valuable possessions. And the carpet! It was sickening! As I stared into one of the displayed corners of the room, I couldn’t make out which was the chewing gum or the carpet. The whole thing was covered in some old filth which nobody bothered to clean up. ‘Is Vic’s and Lara’s room the same as this one?’ I thought beginning to feel a twist of disgust in my stomach. One good thing though, Oliver seemed very vivid, which was the kind of person I needed in that situation.
I couldn’t sleep at all that night. I had flip backs all the time of the day’s outrageous events. I was sweating throughout the whole night, my head throbbed horribly as if someone was hammering nails into it and my legs shaked with anxiousness, nerves and excitement at the same time. Meanwhile some teenagers outside decided to have a night party and kept on screaming their heads off, as if someone was peeling their skins away.
The birds chirped away all night and the stupid ‘tick, tick’ of the clock became really excruciating. To add to all this mess Oliver snored like a mountain bear and as usual during any night there were creepy noises and sounds that kept on trying to make me jump. The window was fully opened and the wind whispered different things in my ear, which after a time began to tickle.
When I finally gave up on sleep, glancing out of the window, I saw:
• The moon absolutely on fire
• The teenagers smoking right underneath my window
• Little black and white, furry beasts creeping around the small playground where in the morning small humans entertained themselves with the little swings, bridges, slides etc… until they collapsed.
• The trees showing people liked to wander through the night directions to different hiding places around the area.
By about five thirty, Oliver began to wake up in a really unnatural way. First he threw himself off his bed, onto the floor, then he found the ‘stinky’ cushion and started injuring his head with it and at last he ran into the thick, heavy room doors (full speed), bounced off them like flexible jelly and landed back on the revolting carpet! I jumped out of bed immediately to see if he was alright, however to my astonishment he fell back to sleep. ‘What a weird and worrying kind of kid is he?’ I asked myself unable to take in what had just happened.
After I half dressed, I tilted the doors to an angle through which I could pass, and studying the stuffy room behind me, I moved outside crawling on knees and hands to prevent myself from being heard. However, when you want to move silently, you tend to step on the squeakiest and noisiest panels in the building as if everything was against you. That is what happened in that very moment.
After the great long lecture that I have received from my guardian for crawling around the building at five in the morning, I was sure it was about six twenty, which would leave me with approximately forty minutes until ‘get up’ time. When you first arrive at this orphanage, the master and the guardians explain all the rules as clearly as possible, so it is absolutely impossible to misunderstand them. First impressions are also important in any new place. My first impression of this orphanage was that it was full of geeky kind of kids (which I wouldn’t really care about), the food was disgusting, the rooms were small, smelly and stuffy and everything was under the stickiest rules and surveillance imaginable. I was right. Well apart from the geeky kids part. But my theory about food was proved correct, with a big tick, at breakfast.
When I at last found the dining hall, which was a big struggle, and sat down on wonky wooden benches next to Oliver and Vic, the dinner lady suddenly began lecturing me, about how much trouble I have now landed myself in, for being late to breakfast! I couldn’t believe what I was hearing! I mean I was only late by about five minutes, which to me didn’t make much difference.
After the boring talk of the staff, the master of the orphanage, slowly called us up, table by table to receive our food. He slumped two spoonfuls of nasty looking, stone-cold, grey porridge into our bowls, and a slice of a week old, starting to get mouldy bread, on our plates. My face twitched by the look of this.
When everyone got their hard to call food, the master told us to bow our heads and give thanks to God for the meal. The children recited a prayer that every member of the orphanage seemed to know off by heart, and we began eating in total silence. The food tasted repulsing. I chewed the mixture of porridge and bread speedily and was one of the first to finish eating. The master stood at the top of the hall on a raised platform, watching over us chewing our food, for any sign of communication.
If anyone spoke, even if they only asked for a tissue or something, they would be sent out together with the four or so people next to them. I knew that the objection was to make children think about others, and make them ask the other person in gestures if they needed anything off the table, but still, the orphanage reminded me of the English work houses during Victorian times that I had learned about in History. However, I’ve never heard of work houses in the Italy. So I don’t know what made the master so strict.
After breakfast, basically everyone went to school. However, me, Vic and Lara were held back. The master clarified with us that when children arrive at any orphanage, they are sent into new schools and new society for a new beginning. I completely disagreed with him, but I didn’t butt in as I would have done with mother and father. I was learning fast.
However, after few boring days always beginning and ending the same way, the master still couldn’t find anywhere for us to go. All the schools have ‘magically’ ran out of places and there was no space for new students, even in an emergency. So we ended up in the orphanage private school, which consisted of about ten students.
There were two other kids in my ‘class’. Ana who I later found out lived right opposite my doors and joined the orphanage two days before me, after her mother died of cancer and father long dead in the Iraqi war.
The second kid was a slim but very tall with black kind of medium length hair and brown eyes boy, called Reese. I later learnt that both of his parents went missing and nobody found them (because the Italian police didn’t bother looking for them in the first place), and that he had joined the orphanage nearly two years ago. When he first arrived he was the only kid in the orphanage ‘private’ school because it was about then that all the schools have supposedly ran out of places.
Reese was a fair guy, two months older than me, and very helpful and understandable. Ana was the same type of person apart from the fact that she had a very short temper, and as I later discovered, before her parents died, she had been expelled from three schools for the following reasons: shouting, swearing, threatening and hitting teachers constantly. But still, to me it sounded like something you would get suspended for, not expelled.
Anyway, Lara ended up in a class with Emma, her roommate, even though she was younger than Lara, and Vic was all by himself which made me feel unbelievably sorry for the little fella.
It was about three months of this same, boring, exhausting routine (so: get up at seven, don’t be late to breakfast, go to class, don’t be late for lunch – only if you stay in the orphanage, go to class for the last two lessons, go back to your room, take a shower, go to dinner hall and do your homework for an hour, one hour free time, don’t be late for dinner and go to bed in thirty minutes). But on one beautiful May day something came up, an enormous chance for me to get out of this ‘workhouse’.
Two strange looking parents came in to adopt three children ( I was hoping it would be me, Lara and Vic), and spent the whole day in the orphanage. That day we also got proper meals and treatment, nothing was as strict as usual. The two wonky looking adults also came into my class that day, probably looking for someone my age. When the rest of the orphans arrived back from school everyone went crazy trying to impress the visitors and get their attention. Things became hectic. After shower time, the master already grounded five kids for interrupting and embarrassing the couple.
The big moment came after homework time. The guardians of each house assembled their orphans in room number order. The occupants of four rooms stood together as one group. I found myself in group D, with my neighbours from left and right hand side and opposite of my room doors. Ana and Reese were amongst me. When the parents began their picking everyone began to panic. However I could feel the moments ahead and I stayed as calm as normal.
One girl was already chosen, apparently from group B, but I couldn’t quite see her through the big hairy heads of other kids in my way. Comparing my thirteen year old self with the seven to twelve year olds, I was remarkably small for my age. My nose still looked like a six year old’s, but my medium length brown hair, coming down to my eyes in an emoish style, was the only feature I had liked about myself. I felt like a toy on a shelf in a toy shop hoping to be picked up by some lonely kid, once the couple moved in to looking at me and the kids in my group, which consisted of seven orphans. Something inside of me, told me, that I was sure to be picked.
Like most of the times, that’s what happened. My legs abruptly stopped shaking, and the grief that hang over me like rain clouds finally went. I was free! I had new parents!
There was one more kid to be chosen. The 190cm tall man, who I would later be expected to call father, took hold of my arm, giving it a tight squeeze. He pulled me out of my little group of friends and snorted, shaking his head melodramatically, without any reason. “You handsome, sweet kid, you like to have a new home?”
“Yes sir” I replied beginning to feel pain in my left arm - the one he took hold off.
“Very good, eh? Pack ya bag your comin with us” he blurted out, a little louder and more demanding than before.
My guardian accompanied me on my journey to my room. Getting there, he chucked all my belongings that he could find around the room, on my unmade bed, ready for me to pack. “You lucky thing, coming here and leaving within three months… not the record though. Just before you arrived, we had another kid exactly your age, who left after a month of moving in. Some kids have been here for their entire life! And some just go straight after arriving!!”
He was getting emotional now, I could tell, but even so, it was impossible not to smile at my luck.
I discovered the truth about the other two kids after I was packed and ready to go. My smile grew larger as I saw Lara, with her blonde her shining in the sunshine, standing next to the fat woman, holding on to her belongings as if someone was trying to take them off her. However my smile rapidly dropped as I saw Reese hiding behind the ‘father’. I couldn’t believe that my little Victor Nick was left out.
The journey to my new home was seemed long, sombre and monotonous, even though we only had to travel around four miles. Tears kept on falling down my wet cheeks as if something terrible had happened to me, whenever I reminded myself of inadequate Victor. Lara probably felt the same way, maybe even worse, due to the fact that she was closer to Vic than me. My guardians assured us that we will be able to visit Victor whenever we liked, and that if the couple decided to adopt any more children, they had promised to take Victor. But I knew that they never will.
My head was bursting with thoughts.
I rapidly fell asleep.
Lara woke me up with a painful nudge in the stomach. I squealed in pain and clutching my tummy obediently left the five seater car when my guardians told me to. I was aiming for a good impression of myself, therefore I did exactly what a thirteen year old boy is expected to do.
‘Mother’ prepared excellent dinner that night, best I’ve had for a long time. The food in the orphanage was only worth chucking away, in comparison to her cooking. Before we started eating, I realised how much my attitude had changed since mum and dad died. For the first time in my life, out of my own will, I bowed my head and gave thanks for all that God had done in my life. Reese sat impatiently beside me, excited about the future and Lara had been in bed since we arrived due to a severe head and stomach ache. She had missed the seventh heaven.
‘Mother’ lead me and Reese into our room and wishing us good night she shut the door and left. I shared the room with Lara and Reese, which I excepted without complaining. Lara being fast asleep and Reese jumping up and down with excitement, I repeatedly didn’t get any sleep that night. My mind kept on wondering back to images of Vic crying on the orphanage’s doorstep, whilst me and Lara sat comfortably in the Mercedes car. All this now made me fell really guilty. I didn’t know what to expect from ‘mother’ and ‘father’, but I promised Victor that one day I will be back, to collect him. There was still five years for me to wait until I could take him under my care, so I completely forgot that idea. After an hour of thinking, I began to cry hysterically until ‘mother’ came in to see what had happened. I couldn’t get a grip on myself after all the misfortunate events.
When I decided that it was light enough to get up, I dressed myself in new clothes, brown kind of corduroy trousers and a white top. I began shuffling through all the wardrobes, little lockers and drawers that I had found in this mysterious room, just out of interest. I found two big fat photo albums filled with pictures of my guardians - whose names I still hadn’t learnt. There was also a telephone numbers book. I speedily flicked through the pages and came to an abrupt holt. I just realised that I had seen my father’s name on one of the yellow, old, scruffy pages. I flipped back and…
There it was, scribbled with green ink pen (probably to keep the writing on the page for as long as possible), my father’s name and the phone number that I used to call when I wanted a lift from school. 07782111916. I thought that this was too much of a coincidence, and unexpectedly my mind drifted to a long gone event. The picture of my burned home. Only then did I realise that it was a little impossible for a two storey family house to just burn to ashes by itself. ‘There must have been something’ I thought ‘well, there always is’.
I woke Lara up and forced her to listen to my wild theory of our house fire. She barely paid any attention to my frustrated voice, but acknowledging the fact that she’s been asleep since six thirty pm, there was absolutely no reason for her to be tired and so I carried on talking. Yet she still ignored my begging for attention, and fell back on her pillows. Sleeping.
The food went back to normal the next day. The five grounded children were also instructed to tidy up the gross dinning hall after meals and lost all their pocket money (which was only about two pounds) for three lengthy weeks. Thankfully Victor happened not to be one of these ill-fate children.
Lunch came surprisingly fast. The aroma of it drifted through the ancient corridors, around the entire building, knocking everyone off their senses. However when all the occupants of the orphanage received their portions of food, the excitement of a nice lunch immediately dropped to zero. What they saw on their plates were over boiled potatoes with a burned stake, and uncooked properly vegetables. In addition to this, the dinner ladies poured in greeny-lemony juice into cups that were used yesterday, and handed everyone a cup each.
Victors face flinched furiously as he drank his spicy mixture of fruits. It was unendurable. Absolutely revolting. The cooks were experimenting again. His wild imagination assured him that it was poison .
Yet over the next few days no one became ill.
The schools were ready by now. All three of us went to the same High School. My fellow peers requested to know all about my unfortunate history. But talking about it made me cry, so I assumed that protesting against them will convince my mates that I will keep my mouth shut and not reveal any piece of information to them. However my stubbornness only encouraged them to carry on tormenting me. I had told ‘mother’ about my problem at school, but all she said was another of her little sayings (sometimes riddles) which was “Unless you are able to overlook idle gossip, you will always be busy with unnecessary trouble”. Fortunately this saying was quite easy to understand, and as all of her other remarks I held it close to my heart. ‘Mother’ and ‘father’ were helpful infrequently.
With all their sayings, theories, riddles and Shakespeare, they speedily became very, very ,very useless. There was something obviously going on between them as well. We realised one day. By that stage ‘mother’ stopped preparing pack lunches for us, she stopped welcoming us home and asking how school was, we barely saw ‘father’ through the busy, full of hard work days and he was almost always out on the weekends. There was absolutely no time for visits to the orphanage or anywhere else. The ‘family’ was slowly falling apart in front of my oak brown eyes. I began to dread the time when I would have to go back to the orphanage. Yet things became worse…
The food was no longer the fabulously cooked King’s meals but became nastier and more disgusting every day. It was cold, the potatoes were hard and the vegetables were over cooked. Day by day, sunset by sunset, week by week, month by month I started to realise more and more, the bad conditions that we had lived in. My mind consistently changed from dreading to get back to the orphanage, and actually waiting for a chance to go back and live with Victor.
Our social worker wasn’t much help either. She tried to convince us that everything will turn out to be for our own good and that our ‘parents’ are sensible and responsible grown ups – with which we totally disagreed. But after few days of struggle, my mind was done up. I now only waited for something to happen to Mr and Mrs Rovanty. Something that will get them out of my way. I felt desperate for an action. The day when I would be free. Yet nothing happened. Nothing changed.
My birthday was coming. I was born on the seventeenth of July, two weeks earlier than I should have been. But I didn’t really mind. No one really cared about my birthday either, or perhaps they didn’t know it was coming up. I didn’t know which. However, one thing that I was very disappointed in was that my sister forgot about it. When the day finally came I didn’t even get a ‘happy birthday’.
I had lived with my new family for two months now, and I began to feel more and more suspicious about my guardians’ behaviour. They talked to me in such a tone, as if they knew what I’ve seen in the telephone numbers book. They were on my case.
But I couldn’t find out what they were up to at all.
On the first of August I got up my courage and asked about the number that I had seen in the telephone numbers book.
“Mother, why have you got my father’s name and number in your old phone book?”
“None of ya business, is it now eh?”
“Well yeah it is because it’s something to do with my father” I replied to her nonsense question with a note of irritation in my voice. It was enormously suspicious, even obvious that she was hiding something from me. Unfortunately I hadn’t uncovered the truth yet.
The days past slowly and Victor missed his brother and sister more with every sunset. He had received a series of phone calls from them but they still didn’t ease his longing to meet. In school nothing really changed, he was the only person in the orphanage’s private school because all the other kids got adopted. Victor was receiving the best kind of education in the whole orphanage, but nothing could satisfy his longing. He became great at poetry, which enabled him to send his poems to Neo and Lara.
‘When the sun sets,
And the clouds fade away,
I know it’s hopeless,
But I still think of your name.
Neo Nick,
Couldn’t get a grip,
But with his evil grin,
He lifted my chin.
When I was ill,
You used to win,
When we played football,
And I thought you were cruel.
But now I miss you,
And you miss me too,
My brother dear,
Rescue me because I fear,
Adoption.
Mrs Queenswig encouraged Victor to keep on sending his siblings his poems. But nothing could cheer him up, not even reply letters from them. All that was possible was to visit him in the lonely place. However Neo and Lara had troubles of their own, and there was no time for relaxing.
Sometime in the middle of August, when the birds sang gracefully, and the leaves rustled with plea, Victor woke up with a horrible headache behind his sky blue eyes. He felt sick and tired even though he had been in bed since eight in the evening and his coal black hair was ruffled up like never before. ‘There’s finally no school’ he thought remembering the fact that the private school broke up in the middle of August and started in October. He shoved his rucksack into his metal locker, where it would be untouched until the master informed him about the first day of term.
Spiders crawled energetically around the corners of the nasty smelling ‘cabin’. This was the first time that Victor had ever used his locker (he didn’t possess any valuable enough objects) so he was surprised to see how badly the previous owner had treated his or her locker.
Victor woke Prosper up with a pour of frost-bitten water over his head. Prosper leaped out of bed and cursed at him with his hoarse voice. He vigorously grabbed his feather pillow and established a pillow fight (just as any eleven year old boy would have done in order to get his revenge) . The room was freezing even though it was middle of summer, but none of the rooms were insulated, so the children could feel the wind blowing. The squeaky old doors burst open as soon as Victor’s pillow exploded with a big ‘bang’ and a tornado of feathers. The master stood in the doorway sending Victor and Prosper evil grins.
As soon as I’ve heard what had happened after Victor had heard his punishment, I rushed out of the house dragging Lara with me into the hospital. We were informed that he fainted as soon as the master instructed him and Prosper to clean all the toilets for the rest of the summer holidays. In hospital, when he woke up he had told the nurses that he had awoken in the morning with a throbbing head ache behind the eyes and probably a fever. The doctor took a blood test and tested his brain. ‘Mother’ told us that the results of the tests will be stated as soon as we get into the hospital.
We found our beloved brother in a hospital bed at the far end of the rectangular room. He was fast asleep with a group of nurses and doctors around him and tubes stuck to his head and hands. ‘He is in a very serious state’ the receptionist’s voice echoed in my head. I couldn’t believe how unfortunate I was.
Mrs Rovanty broke in to the orphans’ room searching for any evidence that might prove her correct about thinking that the children looked through their files. But she didn’t find any. Everything was as she left it three months ago, before the children moved in. She opened one of the secret panels on the floor and lifted out a huge fat book with pages falling out. She flicked through them until she found the page with the terrorist group (white snakes) typed on top. The police didn’t even bother checking out the case of the burned house in Balham, over in London, or the burnt house on the east outskirts of Rome, so it was safe to contact the group for establishment of another attack.
“Yeah I’ve got the Nick kids under my care”
…
“The other one’s in hospital with brain damage and blood poisoning, just as planned ”
…
“He will probably die by himself so there’s no need to worry about eliminating him”
“What do you want us to do with the other two Mrs Rovanty?”
“I command you to get rid of them Bob! In any way you like. But if you send the police on me and my husband, you will not see the daylight again! We must move on to a different case. There’s no time left”
…
We sat next to Victor for two hours now. He was under the strongest antibiotics and medicine that the hospital possessed. The nurses and doctors came in one by one to check on him, every time giving me and Lara a ‘cheer up, he’ll be ok’ smile. We sat on the same chair, Lara’s green eyes were filled with fresh tears and I was trying not to cry to encourage Lara and because I didn’t want another cloud of sadness to sweep over me. For all I knew was that Victor would be okay, and that when the time will come I will take him to our house and share the room with him just like I share with Lara and Reese. I will beg ‘mother’ and ‘father’ to adopt him as well.
Reese came into the hospital at around seven o’clock, with a pile of ‘get well cards’ and sweets from Victor’s friends at the orphanage. He also told us to come home now because ‘mother’ wanted to talk to us three. Lara fell asleep next to Victor so I had to wake her up gently without touching any tubes that carried healthy blood and food for Victor. The doctor also told us that Victor had blood poisoning that could result in very serious sickness and even death if it wasn’t dealt with properly.
On our way out of the hospital the reception lady promised to call us tomorrow before we leave for school and inform us about how Victor managed through the night. The doctor was expecting violent behaviour and sleepwalking from Victor so he moved him into a private room. At eight o’clock he was given a new set of antibiotics and medicine to get him ready for the operation the next day.
‘Mother’ made a long boring speech when we got home about wasting our precious time in hospital when we should have been studying. I was as offended as I have never been before! What she said was a scandal. She forbid us to visit the hospital and Victor again, which wasn’t up to her to decide and demanded to know why we cared about him so much (as if she didn’t know). I mean since when has SHE been deciding where we should go and what we should do in our free time? I thought it was completely up to us! The police would have to be informed.
“ We’ve got a plan Mrs Rovanty”
“What is it snitch? Would you bother telling me?”
“Rob wants to kidnap the two on their way to school today”
“They’ve left already idiot!”
…
“There’s one extra with them, I don’t mind him so don’t harm that boy”
…
“Why is the police on our case?!”
…
“WHAT!!”
“They’re investigating the Nicks’ fire. Where was it in Rome?”
“No cucumber. ON THE EAST OUTSKIRTS OF ROME!”
…
We didn’t bother going to school the next day. Instead we took our rucksacks and caught the bus to the hospital. ‘Mother’ wouldn’t possibly visit the hospital. “Victor is none of my business.” She declared. But he is mine and Lara’s business.
Once we arrived at the hospital, which was on the other side of town, dragging Reese behind us we burst through Victor’s room doors hoping to talk to him before the operation. But he wasn’t there. ‘We’re late’ I thought angrily throwing the chair in front of me backwards so that I could pass. The main doctor walked in horrified, clutching his note pad by his stomach.
“I’ve got bad news” he explained
“What happened during the night? Is something serious going on?”
“Well, we thought that the night was fine. He wasn’t violent and didn’t sleepwalk. We thought that he was getting better now, but he only gets worse and worse as soon as we give him the medicine. He must be allergic to it.”
“What can you do to help him?” I demanded hysterically
“I’m afraid nothing. If he is allergic to antibiotics then there is nothing we can do about it”
“Is there really no other medicine or something you can do?” Lara had her eyes filled with tears by this stage.
“We can only move him to the hospital in Rome or Venice. Here in L’Aquila we don’t have very good supplies. But that would mean that the operations and treatment would cost three times as much and you three wouldn’t be able to visit him anymore”
“Sir, we just want him to get better. Nothing is more important right now” I replied to him sounding a bit tense.
“ Wait a sec. Neo. Venice is like on the North end of the country. You reckon it’s safe to trust these people?” Lara whispered to me so that no one else could hear.
“I just want him to get better. And anyway the doctor said Rome OR Venice. Maybe we can choose.” I answered back to her.
We agreed on sending Victor to Rome for further treatment, hoping that he would get better. Meanwhile, the trio of us decided to spend the rest of the day in hospital, waiting for the operation to be over.
Mrs Rovanty picked up the ringing phone. She was annoyed with Bob and Rob from the terrorist group, and at the moment she wasn’t in the mood for talking with her ‘mummy’. She slammed the phone on the table muttering rude words under her breath.
“Ring! ring! ring! ring!”
“Whose there?” came Mrs Rovanty’s hoarse voice
“WSR”
…
“The kids aren’t in school boss”
“Yes they are. I saw them catching the”
“Hang on boss” interrupted Rob “They could have got on a bus that would take them to the hospital”
“Not possible! Nonsense.” Mrs Rovanty paused to think about the proposition. “ I saw them get on the right… Yes of course they did! Great thinking! I want you and Bob, waiting by the hospital until they come out. Once you catch the little flies, you can do your thing.”
“Mrs Rovanty, which”
“beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep”
The line went flat.
Lara established a picnic in front of the hospital by noon. We had lunches from home so there was no struggle when we got hungry. Yet my senses told me to stay in hospital and not leave the building. Reese felt the opposite. He began jumping up and down as soon as he had heard what we were going to do. At exactly twelve o’clock we left the hospital and sat on the freshly cut green grass. It was a beautifully sunny day, and within the five minutes of our picnic I was boiling hot in my school blazer. I jogged back inside to take it off and quickly ran back out.
Victor was calling me from his bedroom window, the police were attempting to question me about the crime and I was just standing there without knowing what to say, do and how to feel. Now Lara was gone as well. The person who encouraged me. I was more than stunned. I was more than bewildered and frightened. My feeling was indescribable.
When I arrived at home (alone), ‘mother’ and ‘father’ were sitting at the dinner table, apparently discussing a serious matter. When I told them what had happened they simply shrugged their shoulders and carried on with their conversation. That was too suspicious. But by that stage I was alone and there was little that I could do about anything…
You can e-mail your comments to me.
jultubilewicz@yahoo.co.uk
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